I hope Supernatural will come and follow along! They've got to, they cannot forget vampires, witches and werewolves. I still want magic in my sim game haha.
It's safe to say that: Everyone has their own opinion, however I kind of grown to like Sims 4, despite I was bitter at first. So to put it down saying it was a fail or it isn't good might be a stretch as it had more complications than the rest of the franchises. Despite I do want toddlers, it doesn't really bother me as I try to understand the flip side between the creators and players. It was released in rush, and they had to almost scrap the whole thing. What people are complaining about is the things that are missing, here yet they say the want something new that they've never had, yet demand what Sims 3 had: "I want generation, I want seasons, toddlers! Where's pets at? I'm not playing until Seasons and pets are coming out *yawns*" Yada yada. I understand. This is a whole lot of mixed signals EA is getting.
Seasonswill happen, petswill happen. It's safe to say that. In comparison to sims 3 when it came out, its sell out was the idea of an open world, so sims 3 really focused on that until rabbit holes became a load of plum and complaints came rolling in. It was boring to see a whole town, but not experience the little things that sim 2 offered which 3 lacked (also to mention a lot of lag and empty community lots was depressing). Heck s3 had a load of complaints when it first came out. Wait...until EPs came out and Sims 3 became great.
Yet people say EA aren't listening. People complained about lag in s3, so they found a solution and made it more suitable for lower end PCs to play too and cut off open world as that was a big contributor to lag. The community lots were very depressing as it lacked people. So look what EA did, the community lots are filled with sims! I enjoy going out to the gym because I'm not the only person who wants to get fit. Bella Goth is there every time I'm running on the treadmill and occasionally falling. Gym trainers come and make fun of my sim. EA are listening, it's just that some demands take longer than others.
So to end my opinion, I think what this is, is Sims 4 going through this same ol' cycle of people getting used to. This whole stuff pack, game packs, and infrequent EPs. Sims 4 is a whole different engine than it was from the past franchises. Give it time to grow. Patience really is virtue. Next time sims 5 comes out( ...lets cross our fingers...), since this whole emotion system people weren't fond of, they might scrap it, and on the other side will hollar, "Bring back ol' emotions!"...maybe even elders...whoops.
The difference is, that what you're describing there was the game in its first six months. Then we got WA, with a load of open venues we could explore for hours and hours. Which means open world and rabbitholes don't make an open venue experience impossible, later other expansions and Store sets have confirmed that. And like I said, this was handed to us when the game was six months old, Sims 4 is much older than that and many things that are severely missed by people still aren't there.
My lots in 3 are about as crowded as my lots in Sims 4 now by the way (yes, I'm quite tireless where it comes to underlining that every time people bring that up as an excuse for loading screen galore, fake backdrops and uncontrollable sims). Not when I played the game in 2010 but they are now, nowadays computers apparently can handle The Sims and an open world much better. A difference is that in 4 sims will seek each others company more, which in nightclubs is great, but on other venues I don't like it. When my couple is romancing together with a cup of coffee in a cafe, I really don't want four NPC's in a row to join them.
I doubt by the way if Sims 3 really demands that much more from your pc than Sims 4 does, I for one couldn't play 4 on my previous computer. I had to buy a new one (and it handled Sims 3 on highest settings). I was playing Sims 2 a couple of days ago by the way, and when I sent my sim to a venue, there was nobody there. Sims started coming in as soon as I had arrived (I remember this being a disturbing ingredient for people of open world as well, even when open world means every sim spawning there that was closer to the venue than your sim will arrive sooner). In the end, and I waited for a rather long time, there were four visitors (and my sim). I sometimes wonder, now that I play three games simultaneously, whether people aren't judging the games through pink or muddy glasses.
My lots in 3 are about as crowded as my lots in Sims 4 now by the way (yes, I'm quite tireless where it comes to underlining that every time people bring that up as an excuse for loading screen galore, fake backdrops and uncontrollable sims). Not when I played the game in 2010 but they are now, nowadays computers apparently can handle The Sims and an open world much better. A difference is that in 4 sims will seek each others company more, which in nightclubs is great, but on other venues I don't like it. When my couple is romancing together with a cup of coffee in a cafe, I really don't want four NPC's in a row to join them.
I doubt by the way if Sims 3 really demands that much more from your pc than Sims 4 does, I for one couldn't play 4 on my previous computer. I had to buy a new one (and it handled Sims 3 on highest settings). I was playing Sims 2 a couple of days ago by the way, and when I sent my sim to a venue, there was nobody there. Sims started coming in as soon as I had arrived (I remember this being a disturbing ingredient for people of open world as well, even when open world means every sim spawning there that was closer to the venue than your sim will arrive sooner). In the end, and I waited for a rather long time, there were four visitors (and my sim). I sometimes wonder, now that I play three games simultaneously, whether people aren't judging the games through pink or muddy glasses.
Again to mention again, sims 4 was rushed prior to release because of the sudden scrap of Sims 4 Olympus. So it explains the empty game play simmers experienced. Should it really be an excuse? I don't think so, but taking that into account it isn't really fair either. I don't know, Sims 4 seems to have run smoother on my old computer than sims 3 ever had.
My lots in 3 are about as crowded as my lots in Sims 4 now by the way (yes, I'm quite tireless where it comes to underlining that every time people bring that up as an excuse for loading screen galore, fake backdrops and uncontrollable sims). Not when I played the game in 2010 but they are now, nowadays computers apparently can handle The Sims and an open world much better. A difference is that in 4 sims will seek each others company more, which in nightclubs is great, but on other venues I don't like it. When my couple is romancing together with a cup of coffee in a cafe, I really don't want four NPC's in a row to join them.
I doubt by the way if Sims 3 really demands that much more from your pc than Sims 4 does, I for one couldn't play 4 on my previous computer. I had to buy a new one (and it handled Sims 3 on highest settings). I was playing Sims 2 a couple of days ago by the way, and when I sent my sim to a venue, there was nobody there. Sims started coming in as soon as I had arrived (I remember this being a disturbing ingredient for people of open world as well, even when open world means every sim spawning there that was closer to the venue than your sim will arrive sooner). In the end, and I waited for a rather long time, there were four visitors (and my sim). I sometimes wonder, now that I play three games simultaneously, whether people aren't judging the games through pink or muddy glasses.
Again to mention again, sims 4 was rushed prior to release because of the sudden scrap of Sims 4 Olympus. So it explains the empty game play simmers experienced. Should it really be an excuse? I don't think so, but taking that into account it isn't really fair either. I don't know, Sims 4 seems to have run smoother on my old computer than sims 3 ever had.
In fact I think that was the only reason for scrapping things, it being an online game initially (loading screens everywhere, teleporting, no CASt), in combination with having to rush things (no toddlers). It wasn't about finding a 'solution'. My game ran fine by the way, CAS was causing the problem. My Sims 3 game runs smooth (except for CAS and building mode, there simply is too much in there and it's an inefficient system) and in 4 I also have an occasional hickup - don't mind that btw - and there's loading screens spoiling the smoothness, and sims who need hours of staring around doing things. That for me also contributes to smoothness and in my experience Sims 3 does that better.
So, here's my quick take on this. The Sims 4 isn't a bad game in itself, it's decent, but it's a bad The Sims game. For its time, it's (at least to me) still quite shameful. The Sims was on the right track, despite The Sims 3 being a technical and visual disaster compared to its predecessors.
The Sims 4 in itself is fun and enjoyable, but I just can not help thinking back to its predecessors, and how every time, over and over again Maxis just completely fails to incorporate the good of their previous games, but work on the bad stuff. Hell, now it's to the point where the bad stuff is just left out completely instead of being improved
Oh, and no. I'm not hating. I'm just a very, very cynical and realistic consumer who happens to look at the technical and marketing side of things, and I can tell you right now it's still concerning, especially when comparing the current state of the game to the franchise as a whole.
As a person who wants to call themselves an independent game developer, I know the last thing you want to do is create a certain mechanic for a game, then decide it doesn't work, so you leave it out completely in the sequel, leaving everyone bummed out and disappointed unless you come up with something equally as good. I'm of the opinion that you should always consider improving instead of tossing it, even if time and budget don't completely allow it. It'll make up for itself in the end. It's risky, especially for small companies and individuals. Which EA isn't at all.
There was too much quality difference in Sims 3 between low settings and high settings. On high settings the game is anything but a visual disaster, Sims 4 is better in that respect (on low settings it's very acceptable). Sims 2 on low settings is a disaster as well by the way, I discovered when I started playing it and it wouldn't recognize my graphic card, forcing me to play low quality). On highest settings Sims 2 is amazingly sharp and crispy for a 2004 game.
What I meant by "visual disaster" was the fact that it had a terrible art style. I know that's subjective, but I feel it tried to look good, but it certainly didn't. Just look at how the Sims look in the actual game world, as well as how the clothing looks on said Sims. I've never really liked it.
Which brings me back to The Sims 4. The game runs great, looks great, the Sims look great, building is solid and very intuitive, but then the rest of the game is shallow and poorly thought out, whereas The Sims 3 looked quite bad, sounded quite bad, and was nearly unplayable when using all content made for the game, but its core game play was pretty solid.
It's safe to say that: Everyone has their own opinion, however I kind of grown to like Sims 4, despite I was bitter at first. So to put it down saying it was a fail or it isn't good might be a stretch as it had more complications than the rest of the franchises. Despite I do want toddlers, it doesn't really bother me as I try to understand the flip side between the creators and players. It was released in rush, and they had to almost scrap the whole thing. What people are complaining about is the things that are missing, here yet they say the want something new that they've never had, yet demand what Sims 3 had: "I want generation, I want seasons, toddlers! Where's pets at? I'm not playing until Seasons and pets are coming out *yawns*" Yada yada. I understand. This is a whole lot of mixed signals EA is getting.
Seasonswill happen, petswill happen. It's safe to say that. In comparison to sims 3 when it came out, its sell out was the idea of an open world, so sims 3 really focused on that until rabbit holes became a load of plum and complaints came rolling in. It was boring to see a whole town, but not experience the little things that sim 2 offered which 3 lacked (also to mention a lot of lag and empty community lots was depressing). Heck s3 had a load of complaints when it first came out. Wait...until EPs came out and Sims 3 became great.
Yet people say EA aren't listening. People complained about lag in s3, so they found a solution and made it more suitable for lower end PCs to play too and cut off open world as that was a big contributor to lag. The community lots were very depressing as it lacked people. So look what EA did, the community lots are filled with sims! I enjoy going out to the gym because I'm not the only person who wants to get fit. Bella Goth is there every time I'm running on the treadmill and occasionally falling. Gym trainers come and make fun of my sim. EA are listening, it's just that some demands take longer than others.
So to end my opinion, I think what this is, is Sims 4 going through this same ol' cycle of people getting used to. This whole stuff pack, game packs, and infrequent EPs. Sims 4 is a whole different engine than it was from the past franchises. Give it time to grow. Patience really is virtue. Next time sims 5 comes out( ...lets cross our fingers...), since this whole emotion system people weren't fond of, they might scrap it, and on the other side will hollar, "Bring back ol' emotions!"...maybe even elders...whoops.
The difference is, that what you're describing there was the game in its first six months. Then we got WA, with a load of open venues we could explore for hours and hours. Which means open world and rabbitholes don't make an open venue experience impossible, later other expansions and Store sets have confirmed that. And like I said, this was handed to us when the game was six months old, Sims 4 is much older than that and many things that are severely missed by people still aren't there.
My lots in 3 are about as crowded as my lots in Sims 4 now by the way (yes, I'm quite tireless where it comes to underlining that every time people bring that up as an excuse for loading screen galore, fake backdrops and uncontrollable sims). Not when I played the game in 2010 but they are now, nowadays computers apparently can handle The Sims and an open world much better. A difference is that in 4 sims will seek each others company more, which in nightclubs is great, but on other venues I don't like it. When my couple is romancing together with a cup of coffee in a cafe, I really don't want four NPC's in a row to join them.
I doubt by the way if Sims 3 really demands that much more from your pc than Sims 4 does, I for one couldn't play 4 on my previous computer. I had to buy a new one (and it handled Sims 3 on highest settings). I was playing Sims 2 a couple of days ago by the way, and when I sent my sim to a venue, there was nobody there. Sims started coming in as soon as I had arrived (I remember this being a disturbing ingredient for people of open world as well, even when open world means every sim spawning there that was closer to the venue than your sim will arrive sooner). In the end, and I waited for a rather long time, there were four visitors (and my sim). I sometimes wonder, now that I play three games simultaneously, whether people aren't judging the games through pink or muddy glasses.
Everything is relatively and it isn't fair to compare all three games when they run on a new computer from 2016. But the minimum requirements are relatively much lower for the Sims 4:
1. When the Sims 2 basegame was released in 2004 it was very hard to even find a laptop which was able to run the game. Therefore everybody recommended a stationary PC for TS2.
2. When the Sims 3 was released in 2009 it still could not run on many ordinary computers the minimum requirement for the video card was "128 MB Graphics card with support for Pixel Shader 2.0"
3. When the Sims 4 was released in 2014 most newer computers could run it and the minimu requirements for the video card wasn't much higher than it had been for the Sims 3 five years earlier: "128 MB of Video RAM and support for Pixel Shader 3.0" But this is much lower than for almost all other big games from 2014.
So relatively EA has lowered the minimum requirements a lot (and you will see the same if you compare other minimum requirements like the required processor or the minimum amount of ram). Other games have increased the minimum requirements much more from 2004 to 2014 than the the three versions of the Sims did and one of the reasons that the minimum requirements didn't increase more is the small neighborhoods and worlds in TS4 and the fact that the Sims 4 world is only semiopen. Also remember that EA wants to keep the minimum requirements just as low even after a lot of expansions have been added to the game because all those expansions probably wouldn't sell nearly as well if some of the simmers couldn't run them without buying a new computer for the game. (EA's support would also have an impossible job helping people with problems which only could be solved by giving people their money back.)
CC helps me create sims that don't look like others in the town so I'd say it helps with creativity. Sticking with the in game content is boring to me
I know people can do creative things with CC (using patterns and clothes and skins to create amazing screens), but CC is not a creative replacement for CASt (I was referring to the above discussion that started off with "Severely limiting player creativity by removing the ability to apply any material to any clothing and/or objects.")
Sticking with the ingame content should be enough for me and it is in Sims 3. Mainly thanks to CASt. Creating a green striped couch is not the same as downloading one.
@JoAnne65: I still use cc even with CASt in sims 3. I don't think cc should replace it in sims 4 either though. I might not like what colors the cc creators chose and I don't know how to do recolors on my own.
I shudder to think what horrible supernatural travesty we're going to end up with this time.
Vampires that sparkle ALL THE TIME?
Werewolves that are just ordinary people wearing a silly costume?
Witches that look and behave like something from a kids cartoon?
AFAIK, the vampires in TS3 were never intended to sparkle like that. I recall @SimGuruGrant explicitly state they were avoiding modeling vampires after the book Twilight -- including their sparkling.
Supernaturals added the sparkles, and I believe that was made by the other development studio (there were 2 for the majority of TS3's lifespan). I think this is just one, tiny example of the long list of negatives having 2 separate studios work on TS3 came with.
What I meant by "visual disaster" was the fact that it had a terrible art style. I know that's subjective, but I feel it tried to look good, but it certainly didn't. Just look at how the Sims look in the actual game world, as well as how the clothing looks on said Sims. I've never really liked it.
Which brings me back to The Sims 4. The game runs great, looks great, the Sims look great, building is solid and very intuitive, but then the rest of the game is shallow and poorly thought out, whereas The Sims 3 looked quite bad, sounded quite bad, and was nearly unplayable when using all content made for the game, but its core game play was pretty solid.
Personally I like TS3's art style much better than TS4's. The sims in 3 are bad, but I've always used cc for them ever since TS2. TS4 sims would look a lot better without the plastic skin, hair, and clothes that overall make them look so bad. And their fuzzy look on lower graphics make their skin look like dough. Then the whole world is plastic and without much texture. I really don't get why people think the graphics are so much better in 4.
Add in the cartoony animations and the whole effect is quite bad, IMO, unless you only like your sims to be cartoony or if you mostly just use poses and take pictures using high graphics settings and lots of cc. As for building, the trade-off for the easy building was the apparent removal of many features so an even trade-off at best.
TS4 also has some issues in terms of how it runs for some people, and don't even get me started on the awful gameplay and poor design decisions like constant sim spawning and culling and the relationship decay and culling. What kind of sims game gets rid of your sim's relationships? SMH. So I do agree with that part at least.
The Sims
Where are we going, and why am I in this hand basket?!
I also enjoy the Sims 4, but 3 was way better. IMO, the Sims 4 went wrong in two major places:
Killing the story mode. In the first case, part of what made the previous Sims game(s) so good was that they catered to all players. If you were a rotational player who wanted to play every house, you could. And if you were a single (or several) family player who wanted the neighborhood to live and breathe around you, you could do that too. With 4, they limited the gameplay to rotational players only and basically cut their audience in half right out of the gate. As a business decision, it was mind-bogglingly dumb.
You could argue that their story mode was always broken and not exactly fully featured anyway (which is why everyone who cared went to Twallen's mods for Sims 3), but at least it was an option. One of my biggest disappointments with 4 was how much of an obvious facade the "living, breathing" neighborhood truly was: the same handful of Sims, mostly townies, parades incessantly back and forth in front of your house and we're supposed to feel like there's a living world around us. It was sad and ridiculous and felt really, REALLY flat.
Severely limiting player creativity by removing the ability to apply any material to any clothing and/or objects. In 3, I was able to make ANYTHING I wanted. I made an awesome Weird Al for my neighborhood by applying a flowery pattern to a short-sleeve button-up (to create a Hawaiian shirt), applying a black-and-white checkerboard pattern to some Van-style slip-ons, etc. In 4, I can't do any of that. If the Hawaiian shirt isn't provided as an option, the best I can do is look for a mod or settle for a brightly-colored polo. It's not even close to the same.
The Sims 3 was wildly successful because it appealed to both kinds of players and enabled their creativity. Why the devs decided to cut their audience in half by neglecting story mode (especially when they could've co-opted Twallen's work the same way Fallout 4 bought into the Real Time Settler mod and made it part of the base game) is completely beyond me. And why they limited player creativity so much by narrowing the design tools -- a move that would be the equivalent of Minecraft removing the ability to place and destroy blocks -- is also mystifying (I assumed they were attempting to create a microtransaction situation where they would control all the extra materials, but now I just don't know).
AND, on top of it, their designers couldn't even be bothered to make sure that the extremely limited material choices that were provided would match each other. The number of times I've given a sim a shirt of a particular color only to find that the game provides no pants to match that color is ridiculous. Same goes for houses. If you're going to limit the color and material choices for players, at least design them so they mix and match properly. That was just lazy.
Then use CC and they aren't limiting people creativity I make do with what we have but I also use CC. I find it creative enough for me to play. I also use mods so the story mode is fine to me if it wasn't I would make the other sims do what I wanted.
That is limiting creativity and CC in TS3 is recolorable as well in-game.
"because i didn't ever like feature x, so i am happy it got removed FOR EVERY OTHER SIMMER TOO, even if i could turn it off, BUT I AM HAPPY THAT NOBODY GETS IT NOW, i am happy that others are unhappy, that others are not able to play THEIR WAY, i don't care who else plays my way, the most important thing is THAT I GET WHAT I WANT & THAT I AM NOT BOTHERED WITH FEATURES I DON'T LIKE"
great community
IKR?
"Never liked story progression, I'm glad it's out, I hated TS3 because of that!" *doesn't even realise it could be turned off*.
What I meant by "visual disaster" was the fact that it had a terrible art style. I know that's subjective, but I feel it tried to look good, but it certainly didn't. Just look at how the Sims look in the actual game world, as well as how the clothing looks on said Sims. I've never really liked it.
Which brings me back to The Sims 4. The game runs great, looks great, the Sims look great, building is solid and very intuitive, but then the rest of the game is shallow and poorly thought out, whereas The Sims 3 looked quite bad, sounded quite bad, and was nearly unplayable when using all content made for the game, but its core game play was pretty solid.
You have a good point. I notice a huge difference from Sims in gameplay in my game and Sims in their trailers. I want to know how they film those Sims in the trailers when lighting in the game inside a house is horrible and makes many skins look greenish, sickly and or yellowing. And their lips always have that bright little white thin line between the lips, (which I assume is from their teeth) but it makes the mouth look horrible like a bad highlight much like the one around Sims when you mouse over them. I see it in all the pictures people post here, and or their sickly looking Sim due to lighting inside houses. But Maxis somehow skirts around this when filming for a trailer. I wonder what cheats they use to make the over all color of indoors look better.
White curtain is a beige yellow, etc. It really gets on my eyes' nerves.
ETA: Or they film most things indoors with roof off not placed to start with?
"Games Are Not The Place To Tell Stories, Games Are Meant To Let People Tell Their Own Stories"...Will Wright.
The edge is gone, mostly focuses on happiness in every aspect, predictable game play, minimal family play (object babies, no toddlers), missing classic NPC's such as burglars etc, not much to explore, traits have little affect on sims personalities/outcomes, smaller worlds, no cars.
Base game features that were supposed to be included but weren't.
Seasonswill happen, petswill happen. It's safe to say that.
Really? By "safe to say," you mean you have official proof? Would love to see it. The way TS4 made babies as creepy plastic-looking crying furniture, and apparently cannot make toddlers at all, it's going to be fascinating to see how dynamic pets are. I expect them -- if they come at all -- to be not much more than stuffed toys. Or wait, maybe the game will cull out all children to make room for pets.
@Stdlr9 When I mean it's safe to say, I'm saying it's very highly possible. EA knows that these two classic EPs are a big sellout. They won't skip out on them. While toddlers is a whole different topic. In past EPs from past franchises they've never missed out on seasons and Pets and I simply put faith on that. No children would have to be cut as they are already in the game.
Seasonswill happen, petswill happen. It's safe to say that.
Really? By "safe to say," you mean you have official proof? Would love to see it. The way TS4 made babies as creepy plastic-looking crying furniture, and apparently cannot make toddlers at all, it's going to be fascinating to see how dynamic pets are. I expect them -- if they come at all -- to be not much more than stuffed toys. Or wait, maybe the game will cull out all children to make room for pets.
I'm not assuming anything this time around. Just because we had something before it doesn't mean we'll see it again in this version.
"People really love to explore 'failure states. In fact, the failure states are really much more interesting than the success states." ~ Will Wright
@Stdlr9 When I mean it's safe to say, I'm saying it's very highly possible. EA knows that these two classic EPs are a big sellout. They won't skip out on them. While toddlers is a whole different topic. In past EPs from past franchises they've never missed out on seasons and Pets and I simply put faith on that. No children would have to be cut as they are already in the game.
There hasn't been an EP released since TS2 started that didn't have a supernatural. Where are they this time? I sure didn't see one in GT and the alien abductions .....well you know how that went.
"People really love to explore 'failure states. In fact, the failure states are really much more interesting than the success states." ~ Will Wright
Seasonswill happen, petswill happen. It's safe to say that.
Really? By "safe to say," you mean you have official proof? Would love to see it. The way TS4 made babies as creepy plastic-looking crying furniture, and apparently cannot make toddlers at all, it's going to be fascinating to see how dynamic pets are. I expect them -- if they come at all -- to be not much more than stuffed toys. Or wait, maybe the game will cull out all children to make room for pets.
Even if babies weren't allowed to leave the house or very minimal..I could deal as long as they were human. I will never understand why they thought object babies were good enough to sell to the public in their current state. Babies should have been a priority over pools. The least they could give us for making our sims wear those dumb smiles all the time is human babies.
@Stdlr9 When I mean it's safe to say, I'm saying it's very highly possible. EA knows that these two classic EPs are a big sellout. They won't skip out on them. While toddlers is a whole different topic. In past EPs from past franchises they've never missed out on seasons and Pets and I simply put faith on that. No children would have to be cut as they are already in the game.
Comments
Vampires that sparkle ALL THE TIME?
Werewolves that are just ordinary people wearing a silly costume?
Witches that look and behave like something from a kids cartoon?
My lots in 3 are about as crowded as my lots in Sims 4 now by the way (yes, I'm quite tireless where it comes to underlining that every time people bring that up as an excuse for loading screen galore, fake backdrops and uncontrollable sims). Not when I played the game in 2010 but they are now, nowadays computers apparently can handle The Sims and an open world much better. A difference is that in 4 sims will seek each others company more, which in nightclubs is great, but on other venues I don't like it. When my couple is romancing together with a cup of coffee in a cafe, I really don't want four NPC's in a row to join them.
I doubt by the way if Sims 3 really demands that much more from your pc than Sims 4 does, I for one couldn't play 4 on my previous computer. I had to buy a new one (and it handled Sims 3 on highest settings). I was playing Sims 2 a couple of days ago by the way, and when I sent my sim to a venue, there was nobody there. Sims started coming in as soon as I had arrived (I remember this being a disturbing ingredient for people of open world as well, even when open world means every sim spawning there that was closer to the venue than your sim will arrive sooner). In the end, and I waited for a rather long time, there were four visitors (and my sim). I sometimes wonder, now that I play three games simultaneously, whether people aren't judging the games through pink or muddy glasses.
Again to mention again, sims 4 was rushed prior to release because of the sudden scrap of Sims 4 Olympus. So it explains the empty game play simmers experienced. Should it really be an excuse? I don't think so, but taking that into account it isn't really fair either. I don't know, Sims 4 seems to have run smoother on my old computer than sims 3 ever had.
The Sims 4 in itself is fun and enjoyable, but I just can not help thinking back to its predecessors, and how every time, over and over again Maxis just completely fails to incorporate the good of their previous games, but work on the bad stuff. Hell, now it's to the point where the bad stuff is just left out completely instead of being improved
Oh, and no. I'm not hating. I'm just a very, very cynical and realistic consumer who happens to look at the technical and marketing side of things, and I can tell you right now it's still concerning, especially when comparing the current state of the game to the franchise as a whole.
As a person who wants to call themselves an independent game developer, I know the last thing you want to do is create a certain mechanic for a game, then decide it doesn't work, so you leave it out completely in the sequel, leaving everyone bummed out and disappointed unless you come up with something equally as good. I'm of the opinion that you should always consider improving instead of tossing it, even if time and budget don't completely allow it. It'll make up for itself in the end. It's risky, especially for small companies and individuals. Which EA isn't at all.
Which brings me back to The Sims 4. The game runs great, looks great, the Sims look great, building is solid and very intuitive, but then the rest of the game is shallow and poorly thought out, whereas The Sims 3 looked quite bad, sounded quite bad, and was nearly unplayable when using all content made for the game, but its core game play was pretty solid.
1. When the Sims 2 basegame was released in 2004 it was very hard to even find a laptop which was able to run the game. Therefore everybody recommended a stationary PC for TS2.
2. When the Sims 3 was released in 2009 it still could not run on many ordinary computers the minimum requirement for the video card was "128 MB Graphics card with support for Pixel Shader 2.0"
3. When the Sims 4 was released in 2014 most newer computers could run it and the minimu requirements for the video card wasn't much higher than it had been for the Sims 3 five years earlier: "128 MB of Video RAM and support for Pixel Shader 3.0" But this is much lower than for almost all other big games from 2014.
So relatively EA has lowered the minimum requirements a lot (and you will see the same if you compare other minimum requirements like the required processor or the minimum amount of ram). Other games have increased the minimum requirements much more from 2004 to 2014 than the the three versions of the Sims did and one of the reasons that the minimum requirements didn't increase more is the small neighborhoods and worlds in TS4 and the fact that the Sims 4 world is only semiopen. Also remember that EA wants to keep the minimum requirements just as low even after a lot of expansions have been added to the game because all those expansions probably wouldn't sell nearly as well if some of the simmers couldn't run them without buying a new computer for the game. (EA's support would also have an impossible job helping people with problems which only could be solved by giving people their money back.)
@JoAnne65: I still use cc even with CASt in sims 3. I don't think cc should replace it in sims 4 either though. I might not like what colors the cc creators chose and I don't know how to do recolors on my own.
AFAIK, the vampires in TS3 were never intended to sparkle like that. I recall @SimGuruGrant explicitly state they were avoiding modeling vampires after the book Twilight -- including their sparkling.
Supernaturals added the sparkles, and I believe that was made by the other development studio (there were 2 for the majority of TS3's lifespan). I think this is just one, tiny example of the long list of negatives having 2 separate studios work on TS3 came with.
Personally I like TS3's art style much better than TS4's. The sims in 3 are bad, but I've always used cc for them ever since TS2. TS4 sims would look a lot better without the plastic skin, hair, and clothes that overall make them look so bad. And their fuzzy look on lower graphics make their skin look like dough. Then the whole world is plastic and without much texture. I really don't get why people think the graphics are so much better in 4.
Add in the cartoony animations and the whole effect is quite bad, IMO, unless you only like your sims to be cartoony or if you mostly just use poses and take pictures using high graphics settings and lots of cc. As for building, the trade-off for the easy building was the apparent removal of many features so an even trade-off at best.
TS4 also has some issues in terms of how it runs for some people, and don't even get me started on the awful gameplay and poor design decisions like constant sim spawning and culling and the relationship decay and culling. What kind of sims game gets rid of your sim's relationships? SMH. So I do agree with that part at least.
Where are we going, and why am I in this hand basket?!
You don't like Witchy Poo? lol That witch is probably better than the good fairy witch we will get.
That is limiting creativity and CC in TS3 is recolorable as well in-game.
IKR?
"Never liked story progression, I'm glad it's out, I hated TS3 because of that!" *doesn't even realise it could be turned off*.
You have a good point. I notice a huge difference from Sims in gameplay in my game and Sims in their trailers. I want to know how they film those Sims in the trailers when lighting in the game inside a house is horrible and makes many skins look greenish, sickly and or yellowing. And their lips always have that bright little white thin line between the lips, (which I assume is from their teeth) but it makes the mouth look horrible like a bad highlight much like the one around Sims when you mouse over them. I see it in all the pictures people post here, and or their sickly looking Sim due to lighting inside houses. But Maxis somehow skirts around this when filming for a trailer. I wonder what cheats they use to make the over all color of indoors look better.
White curtain is a beige yellow, etc. It really gets on my eyes' nerves.
ETA: Or they film most things indoors with roof off not placed to start with?
Base game features that were supposed to be included but weren't.
Really? By "safe to say," you mean you have official proof? Would love to see it. The way TS4 made babies as creepy plastic-looking crying furniture, and apparently cannot make toddlers at all, it's going to be fascinating to see how dynamic pets are. I expect them -- if they come at all -- to be not much more than stuffed toys. Or wait, maybe the game will cull out all children to make room for pets.
I'm not assuming anything this time around. Just because we had something before it doesn't mean we'll see it again in this version.
There hasn't been an EP released since TS2 started that didn't have a supernatural. Where are they this time? I sure didn't see one in GT and the alien abductions .....well you know how that went.
Even if babies weren't allowed to leave the house or very minimal..I could deal as long as they were human. I will never understand why they thought object babies were good enough to sell to the public in their current state. Babies should have been a priority over pools. The least they could give us for making our sims wear those dumb smiles all the time is human babies.
Oh, OK, "possible," then. An opinion. Gotcha.